The 24 year-old high school graduate who told senior Nasa scientists what language to use when discussing the Big Bang has resigned.
George C. Deutsch, the young presidential appointee at NASA who told public affairs workers to limit reporters' access to a top climate scientist and told a Web designer to add the word "theory" at every mention of the Big Bang, resigned yesterday, agency officials said.
Mr. Deutsch's resignation came on the same day that officials at Texas A&M University confirmed that he did not graduate from there, as his résumé on file at the agency asserted.
Officials at NASA headquarters declined to discuss the reason for the resignation.
"Under NASA policy, it is inappropriate to discuss personnel matters," said Dean Acosta, the deputy assistant administrator for public affairs and Mr. Deutsch's boss.
The resignation came as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration was preparing to review its policies for communicating science to the public. The review was ordered Friday by Michael D. Griffin, the NASA administrator, after a week in which many agency scientists and midlevel public affairs officials described to The New York Times instances in which they said political pressure was applied to limit or flavor discussions of topics uncomfortable to the Bush administration, particularly global warming.
"As we have stated in the past, NASA is in the process of revising our public affairs policies across the agency to ensure our commitment to open and full communications," the statement from Mr. Acosta said.
The statement said the resignation of Mr. Deutsch was "a separate matter."
Mr. Deutsch, 24, was offered a job as a writer and editor in NASA's public affairs office in Washington last year after working on President Bush's re-election campaign and inaugural committee, according to his résumé. No one has disputed those parts of the document.
According to his résumé, Mr. Deutsch received a "Bachelor of Arts in journalism, Class of 2003."
Yesterday, officials at Texas A&M said that was not the case.
How sad. In contrast to all of the other hacks being appointed to oversee senior government employees by the Bush administration, this one did not have a college degree. Go back to college, Deutschy! Get your degree! And then we'll let you run FEMA!
Update: h/t Captainebo, who reminds me that this this victory is owed to the efforts of the progressive blogosphere. Specifically, scientific activist, who noted in his
blog today (yesterday):
Through my own investigations I have just discovered that George Deutsch, the Bush political appointee at the heart of administration efforts to censor NASA scientists (most notably to prevent James Hansen from speaking out about global warming), did not actually graduate from Texas A&M University. This should come as a surprise, since the media has implied otherwise, with even The New York Times describing the 24-year-old NASA public affairs officer, as “a 2003 journalism graduate of Texas A&M.” Although Deutsch did attend Texas A&M University, where he majored in journalism and was scheduled to graduate in 2003, he left in 2004 without a degree, a revelation that I was tipped off to by one of his former coworkers at A&M's student newspaper The Battalion. I later confirmed this discovery through the records department of the Texas A&M University Association of Former Students.
With Friends Like These...
Update II:
H/T to Anne Frank, who points out that That Tom DeLay is being appointed to a Congressional Subcommittee which oversees NASA.
In a move that could help his reelection campaign, former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) is expected to be appointed to an Appropriations subcommittee today that has jurisdiction over spending for space programs.
As of press time yesterday, a source said DeLay would reclaim his spot on the Appropriations Committee while taking seats on one subcommittee dealing with homeland security and another that funds NASA.
Had beautiful minds like these been at the helm in the 60's, The moon-landing probably would have ended in catastrophe.
